


Hold me

by sinistercollyflower



Category: The Maze Runner RPF
Genre: Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, First Kiss, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, Hugs, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Panic Attacks, The Death Cure
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-08
Updated: 2018-08-12
Packaged: 2019-06-24 01:48:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15619812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinistercollyflower/pseuds/sinistercollyflower
Summary: They take care of each other, it's just what they do.





	1. Dylan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some difficulties arise on the second set of The Death Cure. Dylan and Thomas help each other deal.

To say that Dylan is nervous would be an understatement.

He stands there looking at the jeep, tries to remind himself that he won’t be doing anything dangerous with it. Just ride in the backseat, say his lines, tease Thomas, have a good time. But his mind keeps circling round, finding ways to convince him that this is a bad idea, train of thought getting shorter and shorter from ‘it’s nothing’ to ‘danger’ every time he tries to reassure himself. It just looks so much like the other one. It might even be the same one, he doesn’t know.

He’s feeling a panic attack coming on, he knows it’s there, but he thought he was done with that, he was over it. He hasn’t had an attack in months, why now? He turns around and heads to the break room, intent on removing himself from the environment. This isn’t his first rodeo. The problem is, he knows why it’s happening now, and it pisses him off. He thought he was fine, that he could do this, but as it turns out, he was wrong. Great, now he’s angry at himself. Realistically, he knows this isn’t something to be angry or ashamed about, but he can’t help but think of himself as pathetic for not being able to do his own, fun as hell, every kid’s dream job. His breathing’s already getting heavier, tears are threatening to spill from his eyes. He keeps his head down. The break room’s thankfully empty, and he closes the door after himself as softly as he can.

///

Thomas watches Dylan stare at the jeep, then turn around and leave hastily, head down. He ponders for a short while whether he should go after him before deciding it best to not leave his friend alone.

He turns to Wes with a request on his lips.

He finds Dylan on the floor of the break room leaning against the couch, hands in hair, breathing shallow and rapid. He kneels in front of his friend, but Dylan doesn’t seem to notice him. His eyes are unfocused.

“Dyl, hey.” He tries.

That seems to draw attention, Dylan’s eyes snapping to Thomas’ face. Encouraged, Thomas continues in a calm tone. “Hey, it’s just me, I’m here, you’re fine.” Looking him in the eye, he slowly reaches for the brunette. “Can I touch you? Will you give me your hand?” he asks, hand hovering between them.

Dylan nods once after a pause and untangles one of his hands from his hair. Thomas takes it in both of his. “We’ve gotta slow your breathing, okay? Four seconds in, four out.” He places Dylan’s hand on his own chest. “Focus on my breathing and counting, try to follow my lead. Alright? One, two, three, four….” He exaggerates his breathing, taking slow breaths in, expanding his lungs as far as they go, one hand over Dylan’s palm on his chest, the other on the brunette’s knee. Dylan keeps his eyes on their hands, follows the rise and fall, and steadily his breathing slows.

“You’re doing great,” Thomas says, and Dylan looks up at him. “you’re doing good, I’m here with you, this’ll pass and you’ll be fine.” He keeps repeating, Dylan nods and returns his gaze to their hands. His breathing is normal now, although still a little shaky. “Better?” Thomas asks him, searching his face.

“Yeah.” He says, speaking up for the first time.

“Would you like a hug?” Thomas asks, knowing how comforting physical contact is to his friend.

“Yeah.” Dylan says on an exhale and Thomas smiles.

“C’mere.” He scoots forward on his knees, over Dylan’s outstretched legs and winds his arms around broad shoulders. He feels the clothes on his back being bunched up into fists and a forehead is pressed to the hollow of his throat. He brushes one hand through soft brown curls and rests his chin on top of Dylan’s head. Dylan exhales shakily.

“We won’t be needed for another hour at least.” He says to fill the silence.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I talked to Wes, he agreed to move the schedule around a bit. We’ll be in makeup in about an hour and then we have that scene with Dex.” Thomas explains.

“The one we were supposed to do later today?” Dylan looks up at him. “What about the jeep scene? When are we doing that?”

Thomas wasn’t going to bring it up, but Dylan is apparently okay to talk about it. “I don’t know, I just asked Wes to do this one first. I didn’t say why, but he probably caught on.” He says, brushing some hair off Dylan’s forehead. The other man looks thoughtful for a minute, then looks back up at him.

“D’you think I should do that one today?” he asks with a slight frown. Thomas sits back on his haunches, partially supporting himself on Dylan’s thighs.

“I don’t know, do you think you can do it today? I’ll be with you the whole time but if it’s an overall bad day I wouldn’t recommend it.” One of Dylan’s hands is still on his thigh, thumb drawing circles. The brunette bites his lip and stares at it while he thinks.

“What if the schedule can’t be changed?” he asks anxiously.

Thomas sighs. “I’ll be with you, remember? We can work to keep your mind occupied, go over lines, whatever helps. Maybe we can even ask if the scene can be changed so you’re the driver, would that help?” he picks Dylan’s hand up while he talks and starts playing with his fingers. His eyes never leave Dylan’s. The other man looks down at their hands, adds his other one into the mix.

“Yeah, I think that might help.” He says with a small smile. When he looks up, there’s a strange expression on his face. Thomas doesn’t have much time to wonder about it before he’s enveloped in another hug.

“Thank you. Truly.” Dylan says into his shoulder. Thomas smiles.

“Anytime man, anytime.”


	2. Thomas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thomas has a bad day. Dylan tries to hep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no beta, will look it over in the morning just in case.  
> also, whatever i describe thomas experiencing in this is solely based on my own experiences, not fact and i don't identify it as depression because i myself an not diagnosed, just suspected of having episodes and this is what i'm describing.

Thomas is having a really bad day, to say the least.

He was woken up by Dylan assaulting his hotel room door at four in the morning, barely making himself get out of bed, just to come on to set to fuck up every third take. He’s beyond tiered already and it’s not even the fourth scene of the day. 

“I’d lick your chin.” He tells Dylan in the peak of not giving a shit. 

Dylan seems to be in a similar state, considering he just answers with another “Yeah.”

But that’s not the worst that today has to offer. The bit that Thomas dreads is Newt’s confession. However physically trying getting up at the crack of dawn and these past few hours may have been, that scene will be truly emotionally draining. He supposes that he has himself to blame for that, considering he had a hand in the dialogue again and that he insisted that this scene at least gets filmed, in the hopes of doing the character justice one last time. He may or may not empathize with Newt a bit too much. 

Regardless of his fatigue and somewhat shaky mental state today, he intends to give his best perfofmance. Immerse himself and become Newt however much he can. He owes it to the character.

///

Anyone else would think that Thomas was completely fine. 

They’re actors after all, pretending is in their job description, but Dylan knows better. It’s all in the way Thomas seems to wander when he isn't engaged in conversation, the way he'd lose focus, make way more cigarette breaks than usual, mess up scenes. Small things that wouldn’t be that bad on their own, but put together give Dylan cause for concern. The fact that Wes keeps asking them to do take after take of Newt’s confession isn’t helping. Dylan can practically see how quickly it’s taking it’s toll on Thomas, and he doesn’t like it one bit.

So he improvises. 

He cracks jokes, tries to cheer Thomas up in any way he can. He calls the automatic rail camera Wall-E on one take.

On another, while he’s standing behind Thomas he puts a finger to his lips in a signal to the crew in front, then creeps up to him. 

“I'm like a bird,

I'll only fly awaay” he starts, spreading his arms and leaning forward.

“I don't know where my soul is,

I don't know where my home is” it seems like Thomas heard him coming, seeing as he isn’t too surprised, but Dylan doesn’t care because a smile is creeping on to his lips. 

“And baby all I need for you to know is…” Pause, deep breath. 

“I’M LIKE A BIIIIRD” Thomas finally laughs. Mission accomplished. The rest of the crew is cracking up behind him, but Dylan only has eyes for that soft smile aimed at him. 

“I slayed that one.” He tells Thomas once the rest of them have calmed down and are already moving on. 

“Mhm, I could tell.” Thomas indulges him in that secretly delighted way of his, “Just, the energy you brought with you.” And Dylan snorts.

Thomas’ mood seems to lift a bit after that, even though they’re made to do a few more takes, but Dylan can’t resist to throw in one last jab when his friend begins to deflate again. 

“The fuck happened??” he says exaggeratedly at the end of a particularly useless take in his opinion, considering the one before that was damn near perfect. Thomas giggles and it’s music to Dylan’s ears.

The fact that Wes seems to take the hint and declares that they’re done with the scene only makes it that much better. Finally they’ll be done with this scene and Thomas can take himself fully out of that heavy mindset that Newt is supposed to be in. It’s always fascinated Dylan how immersed Thomas could become in his characters. He considered his colleague a much better and more dedicated actor than himself, but he also knew that that could take it’s toll on his friend.

“Hey,” he stops Thomas while they’re getting ready for the next scene. “you wanna watch a movie or play games or something after we wrap up for today?”

Thomas gives him a tiered smile. God, Dylan wishes he could pick him up and kidnap him away from set right now. Wrap him up in blankets and cuddle him until he felt better or fell asleep, whichever comes first. But alas, they still have a few scenes to shoot. Maybe if he feigned a migraine for that last scene they had together…

“My room or yours?” Thomas interrupts his plotting. 

“Yours.” He shoots back immediately, “It’s where the Mario cart is after all.” 

Thomas laughs softly at his grin. “Alright, my door is unlocked.” 

///

Thomas has just pulled on his sweats when his door bursts open to reveal Dylan with hands full of bags.

“Alright! I got us beer and Cheetos, they didn’t have Madelines but, uh……” he trails off, staring at Thomas.

“What?” he asks looking at Dylan curiously.

“You’re distracting me, put a shirt on.” Dylan says bluntly while he dumps all the bags on Thomas’ bed. “Now as I was saying, they didn’t have Madelines, man, I don’t think they even knew what I was talking about, they looked at me so weird, but I did get…” he rambles on and Thomas shakes his head fondly, reaching for a shirt. 

It had baffled him for a long time, how Dylan managed to be so open and relaxed yet unapologetic about some things, especially attraction. He was so honest that he brought it back full circle, so that he could say or do whatever he wanted and most people would take it as a joke, even though it made little difference to Dylan whether they did or not. He said what he thought and didn’t make a big deal out of it. 

When Thomas thinks about it now, he comes to the conclusion that he kind of likes it, both the honesty and blatant attraction, weirdly enough.

“What’re we watching? Or were you thinking videogames instead?” he asks while he helps Dylan unpack.

“I was thinking Star Wars.” Dylan answers, and confirms Thomas’ suspicions in doing so. Thomas finds it incredibly sweet that he’s going to these lengths just to cheer him up. It’s heartwarming, really.

They settle on Thomas’ bed with a beer each, movie playing on the TV, a big bag of Cheetos open between them. Dylan cracks a joke or two but it’s mostly silent apart from the sounds coming from the TV. 

The third time Thomas finds himself spacing out, Dylan speaks up.

“That scene today was hell to film.” 

He doesn’t clarify any further, but then again he doesn’t need to.

“Yeah, especially hard on you, I could tell.” Thomas shoots back. 

Dylan chuckles briefly, but the serious look is soon back on his face. He looks at Thomas with those big eyes for a moment. Thomas feels like he’s being read like words off a script. 

“Seriously man,” his tone has become serious, “are you okay?”

Thomas sighs. “Alright.” He concedes. Turns to Dylan more fully. Dylan lowers the volume on the movie and gives him his full attention. 

“I’m drained, mostly.” He starts. Dylan doesn’t say anything so he takes it as encouragement and continues. “I’m tiered. Have been all day, since I got up, actually.” He takes a swing of his beer. “It’s just been a bad day. I have them sometimes, when I don’t have the energy to do anything, have to remind myself why I’m doing it.” 

The look on Dylan’s face when he looks up at him makes Thomas rush to continue. “It’s really not as bad as it sounds. Nothing near what Newt’s supposed to have, I don’t even know if it’s the same thing. They don’t happen often, and they’re never that intense. Today was just very hectic, a bad day to have a low. But I know how bad it can get, I’m lucky really. There are people out there who have it so much worse-“

“No, nonono stop that.” Dylan interrupts him. He puts his beer down and takes Thomas' so he kan take his hands into his own. “Don’t belittle it. Don’t diminish it’s importance. I’ve done that to myself and it’s the worst thing you can do. What you feel is important. What you’ve got going on is important. I won’t stand for you doing this to yourself.” 

Thomas just stares at him. There’s a fierce determination in his eyes that has the blonde leaning in like he’s drawn to a magnet. 

He takes Dylan’s face in both of his hands and kisses him without hesitation. Dylan responds immediately, winding an arm around him and pulling him closer. It’s warm, and familiar and everything it should be. Everything Thomas needs right now. 

“I didn’t know you cared so much.” He says once they part. Dylan laughs. 

“How can I not Tommy?” he pulls Thomas on top pf himself, kisses his cheek. “You’re one of my favorite people.” He tells him fondly. Thomas chuckles and leans down to kiss him again. 

“Will you stay here tonight?”

“Will you go on a date with me?”

Thomas thinks it over. “I don’t do dates.” He says, then quickly adds when Dylan pouts “But next time we have a day off we can stay in all day, order takeout and not worry about being caught in public. How does that sound?”

Dylan grins. “Sounds like a date to me.” Thomas rolls his eyes.

“Call it what you will.” He says and rolls off of Dylan, who predictably follows and pins him to the bed. “But that’s a yes. I take it that’s a yes from you too?”

“Of course! Was there even any doubt?” Dylan over exaggerates. Thomas pulls him down into a kiss for his effort.

The next morning he’s woken up by kisses instead of pounding on his door. He could get used to this.

**Author's Note:**

> 1) my knowledge about Dylan's accident is limited, so if anything doesn't correlate with fact, that's why, just pretend i'm right.  
> 2) the scene i'm referring to also isn't based in reality, i haven't seen the movie and only base this on what I've seen of the behind the scenes footage, however, it's intended to be a non-dangerous scene, just some dialogue in a moving car, if there even is a scene like that in the movie.  
> 3) everything about the anxiety attack is based on my own experiences in dealing with those. I've been in both positions, so both Thomas' and Dylan's actions are what I did in such a situation, and what I've found to work and be effective. I have checked some sources to see if i'm not bullshitting too much, but if you want to learn how to deal with anxiety/panic attacks please check out official sites with medical sources.


End file.
